


Romantic 'Tragedy'

by Goodknight (orphan_account)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-15
Updated: 2012-08-15
Packaged: 2017-11-12 04:52:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,197
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/486925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/Goodknight
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat can't bring himself to really believe that anything will work out between him and Dave, just in case it doesn't, right up until it really really does.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Romantic 'Tragedy'

**Author's Note:**

  * For [apotheounGryphus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/apotheounGryphus/gifts).



> based on headcanons by ratherso.tumblr.com, and for them as well

Small, curled around the the shoulder, creased around the eyebrows, perpetually frowning, Karkat had always thought the only true irony was in his inability to be noticed despite the constant boil of ideas and imagery that wracked behind his closed lips at every waking moment. He was expected to be loud, been called a bundle of noise making rage and a yappy lap dog by people he'd never met, but when he tried to live up to those expectations, he managed only a creak, like that of a door closing slowly and painfully in his own face, opportunity knocking and deciding to leave when it was let in. No one really remembered he had an opinion to give when they met him in person and he didn't speak. 

Dave Strider, the asshole, had thrown irony in his face like it was some cheap overused joke from a humour forum, made it rain with petty insults, and Karkat loved that online he could fight back, parry with the words he couldn't form with his own traitorous tongue and mabye even win.

He'd met Dave on a chat site, where he'd been pretending he was looking for intellectual debate but was actually looking for a fight because the bruise around his eye, that yellowish smudge gifted to him by a misunderstanding prick during the small break after fourth period, panged angrily and demanded verbal rebuttal. Dave had told him to cool it and said something about cucumbers but it had been hard to understand. They'd moved it to private chat and then given each other their chum handles, pretending they didn't actually want to.

Somehow, jeering had turned into 'no i love you more' 'FUCK YOU STRIDER I LOVE YOU MORE' and Karkat had still never told Dave about his malfunctioning body because his pessimist heart had always assumed nothing good would ever come out of a relationship with him, especially not seeing Dave's weird freckled, white haired mug face to face and having to explain away why he couldn't tell him aloud how much he enjoyed his company.

He'd never watched any movie, desperately tragic and romantically formidable, humourous, or otherwise where the protaganist literally couldn't say 'i love you.' 

So when Dave told him he was starting to feel like he was willing to drop hard cash like it had burnt his fingers and get himself a plane ticket over to Karkat's nearest airport, Karkat began to feel the same nerves he felt when a waitress asked for his order, smiling in a friendly way, pen to paper and waiting. That same clench whenever Dave said someday he'd prod him in the side irl and throw him on the couch for some serious makking, like that was romantic. It only made Karkat giddy and upset. 

He wanted to hold Dave's probably sweaty hand and run through some cheesy flowers and embrace him like a long lost lover and kiss and go for a candlelit dinner wearing their best clothes even though he himself only owned t-shirts and jeans and Dave was probably the same. He wanted his chapped lips to recite his favourite movie lines right in Dave's face so Dave could know for sure that he felt like a movie heroine in distress. 

It only took a second 'come on karkat dont pretend youre not pining for the legendary touch of the man himself' for Karkat to say yes, yes Dave what the fuck ever come to my house, throw rocks at the window. Dave questioned if Karkat was hesitationg because he was still deluding himself into thinking he was ugly or some shit, because he was fully prepared to get that under wrap, smooth it around the edges to complete the seal and pack it away in the fridge never to be released to the fresh kitchen air again. Karkat wasn't watching as his pesterchum dinged with these assurances because he was too busy massaging his temples and damning himself. 

He had already imagined scenarios where Dave was uncharacteristically cruel about his muteness, finding out and breaking off their already fragile relationship, blocking him and leaving him alone to his reclusive habits and self deprication. He'd had daydreams go wrong and take a spin for the horrifying, Dave's personality morphing into a grim characiture of his joking antagonism, all the love Dave said he had melting away.  Now, he had to face those things being actual possibilites.

Sometime around 7:00am, he rolled out of bed, giving up on sleeping, and slunk to his computer desk, tucking his knees to his chest and staring hopefully at pesterchum as it loaded his contacts. When he felt uneasy about Dave, he went to Dave so he could remember how senseless that was. The handle was grey. Obviously. Karkat sighed and opened the folder where he kept the pictures Dave had sent him over the year they'd been dating online: folders full of brilliant photography, artistically captured buildings, flowers, and sometimes blurry people. And then, tucked away between these, photos of Dave himself. Leaning against the counter and tilting his chin up, like the angle would make him look cool and attractive, or mysterious in some way, or standing in front of the mirror, one hand on his hip, expression vacant. Karkat looked at each picture for long enough to burn them into his eyes, studied the lines of his boyfriend's face, the way his hair parted, the shape of his lips. He lost himself in thought over these images, staring blankly and unfocused, thinking about how he'd admire those planes in person, and it calmed him. 

When Dave finally signed on, he cursed him out for being so troublesome and told him he'd pick him up at the airport and they could bus back to his house. The thought of Dave standing in his room was one he couldn't really picture, he could barely imagine Dave being truly real at all. He could only help Dave pick a ticket with a surreal bubble around him, his chin sitting on his knees, the computer too bright on his sleepless eyes. 

He might as well toss himself into flames instead of skirt around them wondering if they'd destroy him. 

He went to bed at noon, telling Dave he'd look forward to his arrival, he loved his shiny, hideous guts, but he needed to close his eyes before he fell asleep on the keyboard and accidentally sent Dave ancient code in the form of lines of Gs and Hs. 

Dave, leaning casually back in his chair with the ghost of a smile on his pale face, told him he'd crack all those codes. Crack the hell out of those codes, and ended up typing long after Karkat had signed off. 

_______

The day, a week later, when Dave's flight was due, Karkat ate a full breakfast and woke up again at an ungodly early hour. He paced the kitchen, holding his toast and brushing his fingers across the appliances, unable to sit still. He glanced repeatedly at the clock, though he had eight hours until he could start for the bus stop. He tried again to imagine Dave leaning the way he had in one of those pictures against his own counter, eating toast with him, asking for a glass of water, wrestling the remote from him, wrapping his arms around Karkat's shoulders and busying his fingers under his sweater. 

He sighed and rolled his dry lips, finishing off the last piece of toast and moving into the living room in an attempt to pass the time with television, kicking the ashtray out of the way so he could put his feet up. 

He flipped through channels, mentally kicking himself for backing out of ever telling Dave about the pretty obvious issue of his inability to verbally communicate in any way, telling himself again and again not to worry about it, to let it happen, and to boohoo his way through the outcome when it happened instead of now, when the sun was throwing lines of light across the carpet and optimism was worming it's way into his imagination, just barely letting him understand the way Dave's body would fit against his throw pillows.

Before he left for the bus, he shoved a few scraps of paper and a pencil in his pockets, as a back up in case his phone run out of battery and he couldn't type to Dave and show him the screen. The bus driver let him on, and Karkat let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. 

He was really going to see Dave Strider, his teenage heartthrob and highschool sweetheart, in a mass of excited people, and he was going to touch him on the arm with his hand. He smiled out the window. 

_____

Karkat recognised Dave easily when he saw him step off the escalator to the main floor of the airport, looking between the arms of two enthusastic parents who were waving signs, pulling his hands in and out of his pockets, wondering if he should have made a sign too. The other boy walked like he'd copied the steps from a rap music video, the shades were decidedly bigger on his face in person, and his hair was shockingly white, swept across porcelaine skin. He seemed almost delicate, not particularly tall or broad in the shoulders, with bony wrists and a large, previously broken nose. Karkat felt embrassed for his own mediocrity in comparison, pushing around the couple and shuffling towards Dave awkwardly. He should have combed his hair, holy shit how could he have forgotten.

Dave waved and greeted him with a typical "sup," his voice weirdly loud, and Karkat swallowed before throwing his arms around Dave's stupid shoulders, putting his head in the crook of his neck, on his toes and hugging him like he might never touch him again. 

"Woah okay, cool." Dave commented, clutching at Karkat's back and lifting him off the ground a little, "Nice to see you too." He placed him back on the ground, feeling Karkat shake a little, and stepped back to look at him. "Wanna hit the starbucks? I'm totally buying you that nasty ass caramel thing you like. I'm buying you twelve of them, like some sort of Christmas in July tribute cuz that's how this is feeling right now." 

Karkat nodded and shrugged at the same time, slowly removing his hands from Dave's shoulders and backing off a little, his teeth clutching at a part of the inside of his lip. 

Dave bobbed his head, one of his eyebrows twitching down. "Thought you'd be more of an insulent windbag, shouting it up about ariport floors and their shitty scuff marks or something." He smiled a little, bent away from the crowd, his eyes only on Karkat, like the expression was just for him, and Karkat felt his world blur a little, his hands still at his sides, suddenly forgetting to breathe. 

He pulled out his phone, where he'd pre-typed his message, short and succinct, because his past self had known his future self would be too much of an imbecile to properly type while in a whirlwind of depressive feelings and was also enough of an asshole not to go into the sort of detail that would distract Dave from what was obviously a hideously angry expression on his face, deluded into thinking embarassing himself with a long, shitty rant would only drive the stake deeper into his long suffering skull. His entire life was a headache, and Dave was standing there looking really really great and perfectly content. 

IM MUTE YOU IGNORANT DOUCHEBAG.

Dave's Adam's apple moved like an elevator in hyper speed, but his smile didn't fade. He wrinkled his nose and shrugged. "K." And reached for Karkat's hand. "I couldn't hear you anyway." The hand not clutching Karkat's fingers tapping at his own ear, his almsot shout of a voice ringing around the busy space as he led Karkat's comatose body step by step to the coffee shop. "Thought I'd get to stare at your lips the whole time I'm here on the guise of reading them." His laugh was low, and if he'd known how loud he was being, it might have been almost inaudible. "Not like I won't anyway." 

Karkat blinked as Dave offered him a chair, his face going blank again, looking tired and relaxed and hilariously gentlemanly, a backpack slung over his shoulder, and Karkat wondered how someone could have so few things to bring and wanted to tell him how beautiful he was. He wasn't sure if he could have said it even if he could speak, so he just sat in the chair and tried his best to look appreciative instead of furious. He was still holding his phone, so he tapped out another message to the golden person settling across from him. 

I'VE BEEN LUCKY ENOUGH NOT TO HAVE OBSERVED THE LIKELY HORROR THAT IS YOUR LACK OF SOCIAL SKILLS WITH MY OWN EYES, SO THIS IS ME INSISTING THAT YOU NEVER FOR ANY REASON BUY ME TWELVE OF ANYTHING. 

There was a pause while Dave read it and chuckled a little, his hands wrapping around Karkat's as they held the phone out to him. 

I'M PAYING.

Karkat typed after he had managed to pull himself out of the mentally incapacitating warmth of Dave's hands. He didn't think there was a way to show how absolutely encompassed in joy he was just sitting on a hard plastic seat with a grade A asshole, about to pretend he was thirsty when he really just wanted to squint until he could make out the outline of Dave's eyes behind his sunglasses. 

Dave yanked at the phone when Karkat flashed him the screen, pulling it out of his grasp with a small 'aha' and had deleted the message by the time he handed it back. "I'm mooching off your humble hospitality for long enough to pay for twelve coffees, dude." He was quieter now, almost at a normal level, and Karkat snorted, eyeing his phone. 

It was almost too good, almost too perfect, when Dave leant forward, giving him a small peck on the cheek, lips lingering like he couldn't bare to let go now that he was really doing it, and Karkat felt so understood and unimaginably idiotic for worrying so desperately, now that Dave was really with him, smelling vaguely of cinnamon and deodorant and cheese. 

YOU'RE PUTRID. 

He typed when Dave settled back in his own seat, a flash of nervousness in his soft face. 

I FUCKING LOVE YOU OKAY.

"Love you more, Kit-kat." Dave snickered. "You know, I always thought it'd suck cuz I can't hear you and I'd want to." 

Karkat nodded. 

I ALWAYS THOUGHT IT WOULD SUCK BECAUSE I'D WANT TO TELL YOU HOW DUMB YOU ARE.

"True tragedy in the house tonight." 

____

The bus was almost full, so they stood holding the bar and swaying, Dave with his arm around Karkat's shoulder, looking out the window as he chewed on the gum he'd bought before they left the airport. 

Karkat felt warm and self conscious under Dave's touch, listening to him rant under his breath about the bus and the people, not even sure if Dave was talking to him at all. Either way, he liked the sound of his voice, the twang and the way his words flew out so smoothly and quickly, like he could really be a rapper if he didn't sound like such a tool. 

He took Dave's hand and squeezed it at their stop, leading him towards the door with no resistance, out onto his street. He twitched his head at his house and fell into step with Dave, whose topic changed as soon as their scenary did. 

"Hey, can you sign?" He asked, loud again, looking straight ahead. 

Karkat nodded, pressing something rude into Dave's hand and smiling a little when he sniggered. 

"Can't wait to get my fingers all over your fridge. All they served were those weird salty cracker things on the plane. Not that I'm not into that shit, because I am downer than atlantis." 

Karkat huffed, knocking Dave's shoulder and walking a little on the grass so he didn't have to leave his side as they made their way up the pathway to the front door. Karkat pushed it open with a firm shove and gestured Dave inside, presenting the utter awfullness that was his entryway wallpaper. 

Of course, Dave thought the little pink flowers were great, rubbing a thumb over a few of them appreciatively and announcing his decision to move in.

Karkat wondered if maybe Dave had been worried about how he'd react too, if maybe he'd stayed up just as fitfully, and he acted on the impulse to hug him again, to kiss at the shell of his ear, the corner of his mouth, and the tip of his fearsomely crooked nose. 

"Not sure why I didn't visit sooner." Dave said, leaning down to press his slightly open lips to Karkat's throat. "Don't think you'll ever be able to kick me out now babe, not now that I've seen the scenery." His hand was still splayed across the sickly wallpaper, his other looping itself into Karkat's hair, twisted at the ends and smoothing it against his boyfriend's scrunched up face. He kissed him properly once before slipping past to hit up the kitchen like he'd said he would, yanking without strength on the fridge as though to ask if it was really okay, then the freezer, lighting up at the find of pizza. 

"Woah we're gonna have a regular party." He flipped it around, tried to spin it on his finger, and dropped it on the floor at Karkat's feet. "Okay well I never said I was a preperation chef, all my talent's bundled in the cooking, babe, just watch the master get his primetime cooking channel on. Uh. How do you turn on your stove?" 

Karkat rolled his eyes, bending under the arm Dave had extended to play with the dials and popping up under his chin, thinking this was sort of like those cheesy scenes where someone put their hands on someone else's to teach them something except he was teaching Dave how to cook a store bought pizza, which somehow made it twice as romantic and a hundred times more memorable. He signed out some well deserved insults so Dave knew how completely wooed he was. 

They ended up changing into pyjamas, Karkat locking himself in his own room while Dave sung him a hideously off key and incredibly innapropriate song about clubbing and having sex with his cheek pressed to the wood, as though despairing that he wasn't allowed inside, and then watching Karkat's favourite movies while trying to feed each other pizza the way they saw on screen. 

Dave fit perfectly into the couch cushions, just the way Karkat had struggled to imagine, and Karkat fit perfectly against him, signing the lines in the movie needlessly against the blonde's lips and alternating between kissing him and impressing him with his ability to memorise Serendipity. 


End file.
